


Pick Your Punishment

by liquidCitrus



Category: Blaseball (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Lost to the Final Boss, Blaseball is a horror game, Choose Your Own Ending, Eldritch Son Scotch, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Existential Terror, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Helplessness, Houston Spies (Blaseball Team), Incineration, Memory Loss, Mental Breakdown, Mute Math Velazquez, Other, Parker III still dies but at least it's for a different reason this time, Post-Season/Series 10 Finale, Team as Family, but remember
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-13 04:46:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28522632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liquidCitrus/pseuds/liquidCitrus
Summary: It feels like a Zeno's paradox apocalypse. Every time they reach the things that should have heralded the end of the world, they're still there, somehow, and they still have to deal, in some way, and there's yet another, even worse, disaster just about to happen. It would almost have been easier, Alex thinks, if things had properly and cleanly ended: at least then the worst would already have happened, and there wouldn't be this constant almost-but-not-quite-hope almost-but-not-quite-despair of wondering if things could disintegrate further.Had just one or two more things gone wrong, Season 10, Day X could have ended very differently. And then after that... well, Blaseball is a horror game.In the face of this, the Spies do their best to keep each other alive and remotely sane.
Relationships: Fitzgerald Blackburn/Math Velazquez
Comments: 8
Kudos: 20





	Pick Your Punishment

**Author's Note:**

> I passed this idea through the Crabitat's writing-general channel, and they came up with many, many other possibilities for what, exactly, might have happened in a Bad End: the Hall Stars all being thrown back onto random teams Debted, the Coin striking an agreement with the Peanut for a joint reign of tyranny, a status effect called Defeated where sometimes runners just decide to walk off the field instead of advancing to the next base and in so doing cause an out, Jaylen being trapped on the Pods. I particularly want to thank Finnicky for providing the wording for the Pick Your Punishment Decrees.
> 
> Content warnings in the tags.
> 
> Hover over images for transcription/alt text.

AS I TOLD YOU

I AM INFINITE

YOU COULD NEVER HAVE WON

BUT

I AM GENEROUS

I WILL UPHOLD THIS “DEAL” OF YOURS

Between one blink and the next, the Hall Stars disappear from existence.

DO NOT THINK THIS IS THE LAST OF YOUR PUNISHMENT

The Shelled One retreats, taking the Pods with it.

And then there is nobody left on the field.

* * *

It isn't that Math Velazquez is crushed by this. Math does not have lungs to crush, unlike the Crabs and their fans, who were left gasping, choking, on the floor by the force of the Peanut's words.

It isn't even that things didn't turn out the way Math predicted. Even before the fight happened, Math had been running statistical calculations. Even if the best players that had ever existed in the League were up against the Peanut, the chance of winning was slimmer than a papercut, and so Math had long since been resigned to the prospect of losing.

It's that Math was _helpless_.

Fitzgerald Blackburn stirs from where they've been lying, with their face pressed against Math's center of mass, and says: "You know this isn't your fault, right?"

Math reaches for the graphing calculator, to respond with its display. [Isn't yours either.]

"Oh gods _damn_ it, Alex is rubbing off on you, aren't they."

Math pokes Fitz in the nose, partially in affection, partially as a way to convey _yep._

Nearby, Reese Clark laughs. How can Reese even be laughing in circumstances such as these? "Get a room, you two."

Math and Fitz get up and leave the video room to take a long walk with each other, leaving the others in their press of bodies. The twisting corridors of HQ close behind them.

Fitz puts an arm around Math as they walk. "I wish I could make it easier for you."

Math leans into Fitz, as if to say _you already are._

* * *

Eight hours ago: dragging the clubroom couches down the hall to the video room so that they could sit close to each other for support. Four hours ago: watching the Peanut beat the Hall Stars into the ground. Two hours ago: tissues, tea, and a few quiet words about how the work they do is still important, will still matter, even if the world keeps hurtling towards destruction.

It is only now that Alexandria Rosales lets themself break down, silently, in a side room. Old habits die hard, and the instinct to hide somewhere and not show vulnerability is the oldest of them all.

It feels like a Zeno's paradox apocalypse. Every time they reach the things that should have heralded the end of the world, they're still there, somehow, and they still have to deal, in some way, and there's yet another, even worse, disaster just about to happen. It would almost have been easier, Alex thinks, if things had properly and cleanly ended: at least then the worst would already have happened, and there wouldn't be this constant almost-but-not-quite-hope almost-but-not-quite-despair of wondering if things could disintegrate further.

"Play Must Continue" was the title of Miki Santana's very last song, before she died. It was about how blaseball was inevitable, about how every time she walked onto the field she risked her life and yet she had no way to stop it. Miki was incinerated just a few days after it released. The game kept going on without her. The world kept going on without her.

Even now the world limps on, and on, and on.

Alex sobs.

* * *

Son Scotch felt the wave of despair at the end of the game like a punch to the solar plexus, and is only now beginning to recover. Looking at Denzel Scott, who is presently staring, catatonically, at the television wall, Son guesses that Denzel is experiencing the same thing. They both interact with the world via a specific, defined set of terms, and those terms have forcibly and dramatically rearranged themselves.

Son is definitionally everyone's child, and as such is currently extracting themself from the confusion and fear of the many, many children who do not fully understand what is going on. Denzel, being the very specimen of an "ordinary" American (adjusted to whoever looks at them), fully understands what is going on - and what is going on is mass existential despair.

"Hey." Son pokes a head into Denzel's line of sight. "Is everything all right?"

Denzel stares and mumbles. Son shakes them gently.

"Denzel?"

Denzel's eyes flick up like headlights. They suddenly grip Son by the forearms. "Please tell me this isn't how it ends. Please."

Rarely does Son show their true age. But now is one of those times. "Humanity is still here. The fact that you're here is proof enough of that."

"...But what happened to Boyfriend?"

Boyfriend Monreal had been another like them, everyone's Boyfriend. Erased from existence by the Peanut. "I don't know. I'm sorry. But we need to keep going."

"I... right." Denzel looks down at Son. "Is. Is my family going to be all right?"

"If you believe they will be, then they will be. That's how people like us work."

"Well -" Denzel starts, stops, looks down at their hands and tries to pry themselves off Son one finger at a time - "I keep forgetting you've been like this longer than I have."

"You are not alone in this." Son perceptibly shifts; sheds the inscrutable body language of an ancient eldritch being and becomes Your Son once again. "Let's go do some batting practice?"

* * *

Malik is in the kitchen, tending to four pots simultaneously and chopping vegetables for a fifth, when Karato Bean comes in. Karato immediately starts pulling dried fruits and nuts down from the shelves and stuffing them in a backpack.

"What's up?" Malik looks over, hands automatically continuing to mince garlic even without needing to see it.

"I'm going back to the Island," Karato says. "I need to be there. After what happened."

"At least stay for dinner? There's taro in the oven."

"There's what?"

"I'm making something for everyone for dinner. So we have a reason to sit together. Don't need to talk or anything, I'll put on some music."

"Oh. I guess I'll stay a bit longer, then." Karato stops. "...can I help any?"

"Find Alex. Send them here. I have potatoes coming up that'll need mashing soon, and it'll be good for them to have something to do with their hands."

"Sure." Karato figures HQ will show them where to find Alex, so they shoulder the backpack, leave the kitchen, and proceed down the hallways.

It is not long before a promising-looking door appears. Karato knocks, gets no response, and opens it.

Alex is curled up on the floor, still shaking, muttering "useless, useless, _useless_ " to themself.

"Hey," Karato says, quietly. "What's up?"

"What a great time for one of the pillars of the team to have a mental breakdown, precisely when you need strength most." Alex clutches their trenchcoat around themself like a blanket. "Sorry."

"It's fine." Karato kneels; cautiously puts a hand on Alex's arm.

Alex jerks away reflexively. "S-sorry. I can't, I can't -"

"You have nothing to apologize for."

Alex says nothing, sniffles, and struggles to slow their ragged breathing.

"Malik said to get you because xe thinks that doing something with your hands might help. Something about potatoes to mash?"

"Oh."

"And having dinner together."

"I don't know if I can, right now."

"After dinner I'm going back to the island, but Malik says we should come together for a bit first. Sit with each other. Eat something." Karato stands up. "Give it a thought."

* * *

PICK YOUR PUNISHMENT

The Spies drag each other through the motions, because the first thing they need to do is survive.

The Crabs are gone, and there are new faces in the League. From Tokyo come the Lift.

Blaseball is inevitable. Time lurches forwards, zombielike. The Spies walk out onto the field and play their hearts out, because what else are they supposed to do? Even if Sun 2 and Black Hole have made an utter farce of the league's scoring, there is no way for them to stop. They may as well make an attempt to win.

It is Reese Clark, of all people, who ends up getting Alexandria out of bed: "Morrow found an opening. Suitcase full of papers being moved from one office to another. We could intercept it."

Attempts to know more about the game are the best hope the Spies have left. So Alex struggles upright. "Wait. Morrow?"

"Kid's got an ear in there." Reese pops an eye out, and back in, and back out, and back in again: an unsettling fidget, but one they have never been able to get Reese to stop doing. "Snuck in the office, levitated the tools in through a switchplate on the floor above, and tapped the phone wires right inside the electrical conduits. Didn't even tell me they did it until they gave me the tape just now."

Alex whistles. "Nice. So who've we got? Some ILB higher-up?"

"Nah. Office admin."

"Who were they talking to?"

"The Commissioner."

Alex blinks. "I thought the Commissioner wasn't making the decisions."

"He isn't. But he has to approve and sign a lot of forms, and their fax machine isn't working. Because Morrow sabotaged it."

* * *

It's a remarkably simple operation, when all is said and done.

Sabotage the secretary's car. Be the taxi that the secretary calls instead. Engage the secretary in an exceptionally detailed and absorbing conversation about their respective pets. Have Sosa (who is unusually good at fitting into tight spaces) steal the briefcase by pulling it in through the space underneath the back seat, replacing the files inside with copies of a completely different file. Surreptitiously put the briefcase back when done. Drop the secretary off at the ILB main offices.

Denzel Scott pulls around a corner and takes off the taxi livery, then speeds back out onto the highway. They say to Sosa: "You got it?"

"Yeah," Sosa replies, and begins to read the papers as they drive around in circles for another two hours before actually setting back out towards home.

The papers are about rules changes.

The papers are demands that the Peanut is making of the ILB.

* * *

Alex and Jordan sit in an office in HQ, around one end of a conference table, sifting through the heisted papers.

"I took a few days trying to crack the encryption on these pages," Alex says, "but no matter what I tried, I couldn't get anything out of it. So I sent it by Math, who immediately identified it as a block of low-level machine code. A computer program."

Jordan splays their fingers on the table and considers the paper. "Did you run it?"

"I've taken the liberty of scanning it in and then decompiling it. I'm not the best at code, but with the help of Math we've figured out a little bit about what it might do."

"So what does it do?"

"It's a program that calculates star rankings, we think. To identify who the best players are."

Jordan swears. "Harvest."

"Precisely."

Jordan pushes that stack aside and pulls in another. "What about these?"

"Arcane ritual stuff. Marco and Morrow are trying to figure out what exactly it does." Alex indicates part of an outline on the front page. "They think this part of it has something to do with free will, or messing with it."

Jordan looks up at Alex. "And the rest of it?"

"They've isolated a small part of the ritual that could be done safely and got a fragment of peanut shell."

"Peanuts. Free will. This one's probably got to do with defining the precise effects required of the Ominous Red Line, then?"

"Yeah, that's about what I figured."

"So what about Relegation?"

"That one's easy." Alex separates a single sheet of paper out from the pile.

_The last place team is defined as the one that possesses the fewest Wins at the end of the regular season. Any ties will be broken by Divine Favor._

* * *

Theodore Holloway has been having a string of bad days. There are no thrills to be had in a Blaseball where the only risk is to your league standings. And the others have barely even come up with missions, let alone had any to pass on. So Teddy paces back and forth in the video room, watching Fitzgerald Blackburn take notes on one particular screen.

Eventually, Fitz hits the pause button, looks over one shoulder, and asks: "What's up?"

"I wish there was something I could do." Teddy turns on one heel; begins walking across to the other side of the room again. "I'm sure this Peanut stuff is important, but almost all of it is intrigue and observation and infostuff. I can't do anything about it."

Fitz spins the chair around to face Teddy. "I mean, there isn't anything to be done about it that needs your specific skillset at the moment."

Teddy stops, whirls right around, and marches towards Fitz. "That's the whole problem! I want to help and there's nothing I can even do!"

"I could make something up to make you feel useful, but I'm guessing that isn't what you actually want?"

Teddy is only a few feet away from Fitz now, looming. "I'm not an idiot."

Fitz raises both hands in surrender. "I was just trying to explain my thought process!"

" _Don't_ patronize me -" And suddenly there is a massive stuffed bear on the floor. It falls backwards and lies there, silent.

Fitz stares at it for a long moment, then turns back to their work.

It's routine work - transcribing the events in a security camera recording - which means that Fitz can bury their feelings and focus entirely on trying to describe who's doing what at what timestamp. _Individual in ten-gallon hat comes to sit on bench; attempts to make conversation with individual wearing dark hair in bun, who continues to ignore everyone and play a game on their phone._ They press the foot switch to fast-forward the tape. _This continues for roughly three minutes..._

A good half an hour later, Teddy Holloway is no longer a stuffed bear. "Okay, so what was I doing?"

Fitz startles, nearly toppling out of their chair. "I forgot you were in here."

"I forgot I was in here too," Teddy says. "So. Uh. I want to apologize for snapping at you."

"You had a point."

"I could've conveyed it in a way that was less like that."

"Okay, but I... deserved it, right?"

"If you're asking for someone to absolve you of your guilt you're asking _entirely_ the wrong person." Teddy sighs. "I'm sorry for being mean, I should not have taken my frustration at this situation out on you, I'm going to go sort out my emotions elsewhere, and you should probably sort out your emotions elsewhere also."

Door slam.

Fitz texts Math a single question mark, and then rests their head in their hands while waiting for Math to respond.

* * *

Math arrives to find Fitz sitting on the couch, wrapped in a blanket. Wordlessly, Math sits next to them.

"Harvest's probably going to pass," Fitz says, "and I'm going to be the one. I just know it."

Math retrieves the calculator; hits buttons. [And not Alex?]

"Alex doesn't have five stars in anything, and isn't living on borrowed time."

Math stretches out on the couch to put a limb around Fitz's shoulders. [I could run the numbers, if you wanted.]

"Don't bother. I've always known that this is how it ends." Ink-black tears roll down Fitz's face. "My nature catching up with me. Me disappearing into the wind, like I should have at the very beginning."

Math wipes the tears off Fitz's cheeks with the ILB's gift of fingers.

"I'm scared." Fitz buries their face in the blanket. "I don't want to die."

The rapid click of calculator buttons. Eventually, Math gently tilts up Fitz's chin to show Fitz the screen. [I'll miss you, my little flame. But I am glad to have known you, and I will remember you for the rest of time.]

Fitz whispers to Math through the tears: "Thank you."

* * *

The black hole swallows ten runs and a Spies win, and just like that they're out of the playoffs.

"There has not been a single solar eclipse this season," observes Denzel, afterwards, in the locker room. "Nobody has died. Just good old-fashioned blaseball chaos."

"Peanut's resting on its laurels," says Alex. "Something is about to go very, _very_ wrong. I just know it."

Reese pops out their facial features and tosses them in a basket, then begins to scrub their now entirely featureless face down with soap. "I wonder if the office figured out what we did. I hope they didn't."

"So what happens next?" asks Marco.

Fitz picks up Son's jacket and tie, stuffing them into an oversized laundry bag for transportation back to... wherever their uniforms go. "I guess we keep going."

* * *

Neither finals team wants to win the championships. They try to get the Black Hole to swallow win after win after win, dragging the finals out longer every time, but eventually something has to give. Someone makes too many mistakes, and ends up winning.

The Garages scramble to get off the field as fast as possible.

Nothing happens.

The Sunbeams stare up at the sky, frozen in terror.

Nothing happens.

Twenty minutes later, the confused, dazed, exhausted Sunbeams leave the field.

Nothing happens.

Nothing happens.

Nothing happens.

Why is nothing happening?

* * *

Weeks later:

The Commissioner stands at the podium, fidgeting with the sleeves of his suit. "If I may have your attention," he says, leaning into the microphone. "I have an announcement to make."

The crowd quiets.

He picks up a sheet of paper, reading from it without looking up. "The Shelled One is ascendant. The sky is dark. Your punishment should have been enacted. However, there has been a... clerical... error."

Silence.

"The Shelled One has produced a list of demands, which the ILB has not met. The ILB has been unable to meet them due to the paperwork failing to arrive by the implementation due date."

The sky darkens.

"The Blaseball Gods have requested that we find and remove the traitor responsible. An internal audit has revealed that the Commissioner refuses to produce for inspection, let alone sign, the paperwork required for the present Election's Decrees to be put in place for next season. We can only assume that the Commissioner has destroyed said paperwork."

Murmurs from the crowd.

"As punishment for this inexcusable act of treachery, the Internet League formally declares that the Commissioner is no longer doing a great job. Parker MacMillan the Third is to be summarily executed -" Parker brings the paper closer to his face, squints in disbelief - "Wait, I'm supposed to _what_?"

There is flame behind the podium.

A moment later, there is only ash.

* * *

The smoke from what's left of the Commissioner is still on screen.

Sosa is standing there, perfectly still, saying nothing, their hat slowly sliding downwards to cover their face.

"I killed him," Alex says, burying their face in their arms. "This is my fault. It has to be my fault. We shouldn't have -"

"No, _I'm_ the one who killed him." Denzel's windshield wiper fluid is apparently leaking. "Because if I hadn't participated in that heist..."

"It's _mine_ ," Morrow argues, "I'm the one who broke the -"

Jordan grabs the table and flips it. It smashes onto the floor, breaking in two, scattering pens, papers, and power strips everywhere. The video feed cuts abruptly to static.

Everyone looks at Jordan, speechless.

"This is a sorry excuse of a blame game. If you're going to do this, come help me preheat the oven so you can play hot potato _properly_." And with that, Jordan leaves.

Morrow drags the remains of the table into a corner. Alex unplugs everything and assesses the damage to the electronics: Jordan somehow perfectly severed one of the network connections. Sosa leaves the room, and returns a few moments later with a broom. Denzel puts some music on, only for Reese to immediately start arguing with Denzel about which radio station they should be playing.

Nobody says anything else about blame.

* * *

None of the Decrees go into effect. None of the Blessings are passed. The election goes on and on and on, without conclusion.

The Peanut proclaims that there is to be a grand siesta: for the fans, too, must be punished, and what better way to punish them than to cut them off from being able to see blaseball while the Peanut does what it will with its progeny?

* * *

Eventually:

PICK YOUR PUNISHMENT

The two decrees with the most votes from the community will go into effect.

But which two?

* * *

**Relegation**

Nobody even remembers which team was removed from the league. Its existence, its history, its players, have been ripped out of everyone's memories, leaving only a jagged-edged hole.

This is discovered when Jessica Telephone is found catatonic on the streets of some small town in Wyoming, mumbling about the brother she swears she had, about the life nobody can verify that she lived. Why does everyone remember her as a first-class hitter, when she can't even remember which way to hold a bat? What if there were others who had been similarly cored out and left somewhere, unremembered and unremarked upon because they weren't so famous and well-connected?

* * *

**Harvest**

Together, the Spies open the sealed package containing Fitzgerald Blackburn's succession planning documents. There is a letter for each of them. Shortly afterwards, Math disappears into what used to be Fitz's room.

Several days later, Alex finds Math still there, protectively curled around a self-portrait Fitz had once made.

According to the files, the next of the Spies to be on the chopping block, next season, if Harvest is not repealed, is Jordan Hildebert. Alex takes a deep breath, puts the file down, and stands up to go find them.

* * *

**False Idols**

The Peanut tires of the attempts to manipulate the idol board, and shells everyone above the Line halfway through the season. The Peanut then trots out the three worst players on the Pods, incinerating them and replacing them right then and there.

During the Peanut's post-finals victory lap, a blank-eyed Pods player doesn't even bother trying to throw to an infielder after scooping up the ball. With unerring aim, they throw the ball directly at the runner, who crumples to the ground. Out. One by one, the "winners" of the ILB championships are crippled with the inability to run more than one base at a time.

The Peanut laughs.


End file.
